When practicing yoga asana (the physical poses of yoga) at the Green Room you are often thrown little suggestions of how to change your thought patterns, habits and behaviours to help you improve the current situation. Over time and with more practice you start to see the wisdom you learn to master on the mat, prove useful in situations off the mat.

It can be as simple as doubling your exhalation to calm down when you are anxious, in bad traffic, or in a meeting where you simply need to bite your tongue. It will develop over time to the more complex art of starting to observe your self. You become accustomed to watching your self in long pose holds. Watching which poses bring up anger, emotions, or those you just HAVE TO RUN FROM because the fear of what is hiding in that pose is too much for you. You become familiar with watching your ego react. Catching it out sometimes, or sometimes getting caught up in it and forcing a pose that really is not appropriate for your body in that moment.

Let us take this off the mat.

Your mission should you choose to accept it, is to pause and observe. Pause before we react to any situation – whether that be a conversation, an environment, a perceived wrong doing, etc etc. Do you have the power to PAUSE before your ego takes over? Watch how you automatically want to react. Defensive, aggressive or walk away? Assess whether this is a productive reaction. Assess how the best version of yourself would react in that situation.

And then, a lot more informed and in control of the reaction, but more importantly how the present situation and your reaction will affect you and your emotions: Act in the manner the best version of yourself would.

You will be surprised at both how difficult this is to practice regularly, but also how amazing the impact is when you start to take control of your reactions :)

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Authors

KORINNE McNEILL: Yoga is life for Korinne. Creator of the Green Room Korinne is grateful everyday that she gets to share her passion with others.DAVE VAN DAMME: An information addict, Dave loves exploring the scientific reasons behind why yoga makes you feel awesome.